Statewide unemployment rate edged higher in August

New York state added 22,700 private-sector jobs in August, but the unemployment rate also rose as job growth failed to keep pace with an increase in the labor force.

The state Labor Department reported the jobless rate rose to 7.6 percent from 7.5 percent in July, as more New Yorkers looked for work. In the state outside New York City, it rose to 6.9 percent from 6.8 percent in July, below the nation’s jobless rate of 7.3 percent. All figures are seasonally adjusted.

“With the addition of 22,700 private sector jobs in August, the New York state economy experienced its largest monthly jobs gain since January 2013,” said Bohdan Wynnyk, deputy director of the Labor Department’s division of research and statistics. He said New York was one of just nine states to regain all of its private sector jobs lost during the recession.

The Capital Region added 5,000 jobs over the past year, 4,500 of them in the private sector, according to the report. Local unemployment rates for August will be released next Tuesday.

The strongest job gains locally were in education and health services, up 2,400; leisure and hospitality, up 1,500; construction and natural resources, up 1,200; and manufacturing and government, each up 500.

Losses came in trade, transportation and utilities, down 700; and information and the sector business and professional services, each down 400.